Death of a Salesman takes place in New York and Boston. The action begins in the home of Willy Loman, an aging salesman who has just returned from a road trip. Willy is having difficulty remembering events, as well as distinguishing the present from his memories of the past. His wife, Linda, suggests that he request a job in New York rather than travel each week. Linda and Willy argue about their oldest son Biff. Biff and his brother, Happy, overhear Willy talking to himself. Biff learns that...

Fate Explored in Romeo and Juliet “A pair of star-cross’d lovers,” (prologue, line 6). Since the opening of the play, Romeo and Juliet were destined to die. Throughout each act and throughout each scene, from constant foreshadowing and ill omens, even Romeo and Juliet knew their tragic fate. As much as the two lovers wanted to be together, all their efforts and the efforts of others were purely futile, and as much as everyone wanted to blame others, only fate is to blame. ...

Nathaniel Hawthorne's character Hester Pyrnne in "The Scarlet Letter" In the novel The Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester Prynne undergoes both physical and emotional revelations. Hester is directly affected by the consequences of breaking moral and social codes of behavior. The novel is a story of a young woman who commits adultery, and stays strong when the community harasses her. She will not reveal the identity of her daughter Pearl's father. In the end of the novel,...

The Stranger by Camus: The Stranger is a story about a man named Meresault living in Algiers. Algiers is at the very northern top of Africa. Meresault is instantly labeled as odd in the readers mind when the story starts: "Mother died today. Or, maybe, yesterday; I can't be sure." As you read along you keep wondering, "What is going on inside the mind of this man? Is he insane?" Because of this first seed that is planted in your mind, everything that follows is tainted with the first...

Analysis of Gulliver's Travels The narrator and protagonist of the story, Lemuel Gulliver is an English ship's surgeon carried by circumstance into a series of adventures in strange parts of the world. He is well-traveled and speaks several languages. He grew up in Nottinghamshire, the third of five sons in a respectable, middle-class family. While in school he held jobs: as an apprentice, he proved his competence; as a physician, he was able to get work on ships, which had been his lifelong...

Many lessons are embedded into Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (Bantam Books 1991), including how society acts towards the different. The monster fell victim to the system commonly used to characterize a person by only his or her outer appearance. Whether people like it or not, society summarizes a person's characteristics by his or her physical appearance. Society has set an unbreakable code individuals must follow to be accepted. Those who don't follow the "standard" are hated by the crowd...

Speech Analysis of Marc Antony in Julius Caesar In Antony's funeral oration, he abides by his agreement with Brutus not to place blame on the conspirators. However, he manages to turn the mob against the conspirators. How does he do this? Use examples from the speech to support your answers. Antony uses many rhetorical tricks to persuade the people to go against the conspirators and support him and Caeser's goals. Marc Antony is a respectable man and is himself honorable, but most...

Hamlet: To Be or Not To Be" The "To Be or Not To Be" speech in the play, "Hamlet," portrays Hamlet as a very confused man. He is very unsure of himself and often wavers between two extremes. In the monologue, he contemplates death; over whether he should commit suicide or seek revenge for his father's death. The play also shows how Hamlet thinks over things too much. From the analysis over life and death he comes to the conclusion that he would rather live and seek revenge for father's...

Themes Behind the Use of War in "Slaughter-House Five" War plays a significant role in shaping human history. The rires of war can temper a man until he is unbreakable, or they can melt him with their heat. For Kurt Vonnegut, the flames of war do something extraordinary. They burn away his ability to accept the atrocities that humans direct toward one another. They galvanize his mind, removing any doubt as to the treacherous legacy that comes with the violence of war. Most importantly, they...

Book Review of "The Color Purple" The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, is a very intense book to read. By intense, I mean it is a book touching very difficult and hard aspects of life of a poor, black oppressed woman in the early twentieth century. Walker does social criticism in her novel, mostly criticizing the way black women were treated in the early twentieth century. Walker uses the life experiences of Celie to illustrate her social criticism. The Color Purple is not written in...